Heathrow airport fire destroys Canadian Ski Team equipment

Canada’s Men’s Alpine Ski Team will move ahead with their plans for a on-snow training camp in New Zealand later this month despite the loss of the entire fleet of equipment and supplies in a warehouse fire at London’s Heathrow Airport last week.

“Literally everything that we had for the camp, all the skis, electronic timing, communications and computer equipment has been lost. So at this point we are starting from scratch and working our way toward what is needed to make this training camp happen,” said Alpine Canada Alpin President Gary Allan.

Early estimates put the total loss around $150,000, a figure that is largely expected to be covered under insurance. However, the process could take months, making it unlikely the equipment will be replaced before the upcoming training camp begins.

The Canadian Alpine Ski Teams were using the airport warehouse to hold New Zealand training camp supplies, and were scheduled to be shipped this week.

“The cooperation that we have received from our many suppliers and partners has helped a lot, but there’s a long way to go,” he said. “The national teams have a lot of momentum following the Olympic Winter Games and we felt this camp is too important to lose. This coming season is too important. We need to make sure that our skiers get on snow if we want to be successful against the top ski racing nations.”

Preliminary reports indicate the cause of the fire was a forklift truck that caught ablaze at the warehouse at Heathrow Airport on July 9. No one was injured in the fire.